Tacos & Pizza & Shitty Dive Bars Oh My

I was talking with a friend about growing up in Roanoke, Va and we agreed that one of the best things about growing up there in the 80’s and 90’s was the Iroquois Club. Gwar, Danzig, Bad Brains, Steppenwolf, The Ozark Mountain Daredevils, John Lee Hooker, Load, and Transit Locomotion all played there. The big name bands were great and all(the summer of ‘89 was magical) but the last two bands were way more important, because they were friends, and even if I wasn’t into their songs ( mostly covers of stuff I was ‘too cool’ to be into at the time), I was stoked to go see them. After we all left town, but would come back for Christmas, one of these bands would play Christmas Day Night, and the Iroquois would serve as a place to see old friends, enemies, exes, crushes, etc. that you hadn’t thought of in years. Kind of like an all ages high school reunion. Now, I’ve been to better music venues (Tacoland R.I.P. Ram), more historical (CBGBs) wilder(the strange metal warehouse in Mexico City that I just kind of stumbled upon and am still not sure if it was real or not) and ones that became more like home (Twisters or The Metro in RVA) but you never forget your first. It leaves an imprint on you that you judge all the others by. Food is the same way. Your first pizza, taco, ice cream, etc becomes the standard by which you judge every one that comes after. This is why hardshell tacos are so popular despite being harder to eat and objectively worse on all levels than a homemade tortilla (flour or corn, fight me), the crunch of the Ortega/Old El Paso shell and the subsequent shower of filling onto the plate, floor, lap and table, take us back to a simpler time. Here’s to shitty clubs and hardshell tacos!!